Thursday, December 11, 2014

I decided to degen it up yesterday by taking the day off and go play a little poker. My wife is away until Tuesday, so I have to get the kids off to school and back again - I have about 4-5 hours in between to get some time in. The table was surprisingly loose for a 10am table - these were mostly regs, but some of the regs were pretty woeful to say the least. I'm not going to get into the regs and surprising play, but there were many many profitable spots including calling down 2nd and 3rd pairs a ton for crazy prices...

There were 2 hands in question that I'll share today:

2nd or 3rd hand against a brand new player, I'm dealt TT in position and raise $15 against 2 limpers. Get called in both spots.

Flop comes QQ5 rainbow - it checks to me. I check through thinking that only a Q is going to call in this spot, so why bet. Turn is an 8 and new player leads for $35. I flat and the other player folds.

River is a blank. He insta-shoves on me (~$125 effective). I have showdown value here - what to do, what to do? Knowing nothing about this player, I fold.

A bunch of hands later, I see him betting & raising a TON of hands. He's getting away with it on small pots, where he's raising unreasonably large on mostly blank flops, but his raises seem out of whack; it appears that he's trying to win the pots outright and buy people off hands rather than get value for anything. He's clearly fishy, and I'm thinking I made a bad lay down there... I think I have to lay down there though given the strength he's shown and the lack of knowledge.

I get retribution from him (and then some) when the following hand arises:
I limp QJo in the HJ position (he's to my right so I continually have position on him). It limps to a 4 way flop:

Q 6 2 (2 diamonds). BB leads for $8, folds around to fish and he raises to $20. I think for a minute and raise to $40. BB folds and fish calls.

Turn is a blank and fish checks. I think about how to maximize value here - I bet $75 and he insta-calls.

River is another blank and he checks again. I think I can eek out some value here - perhaps $50 or so, but my thought is that he's calling better hands and folding draws, so why bet here? I guess I shouldn't think when I'm dealing with a fish, and only act strong. However, I [perhaps weakly] check through and wait for him to show. He shows K6o, and I win a sizable pot for a pair of Queens, J kicker. There were many eye rolls and dropped jaws when he showed mid pair after calling $115! This guy would go on to bust through his starting stack, but he's apparently well known to do this kind of bad play. QJ is such a check / call get-to-showdown-cheaply type of hand 99% of the time, but I got nice value for it on this go-around against this kind of player...

Tony - the"blanks" truly have no concern in the story. If the case is the "blank" gave him a "canoe", then it's still not critical to the read of the situation. The blank only proves out that it's not an overcard, nor a close card - and not a completion of a draw or backdoor draw. It's a "blank."

1st hand i believe he had a queen or better . checking hoping u would c-bet then when u didnt . he bet turn and river bcuz like the saying goes u got to build yr own pot. probably was hoping u make the donk/hero call on river with KK or AA just to show the table how bad yr luck was. but u has 1010 so ez fold. imo

:-) I still have no clue what a "canoe" is? Is that an little boat instead of an overboat? Still not understanding why a "7" or some other BS turn card - regardless whether it turned the villain a boat - has any bearing in the hand history.

If the dude got lucky and hit a set on a floated under pair, so be it - does it change anything whether the set was 8's or 7's or 2's?

QQ5 is the exact type of hand you should be c-betting on -- a paired board, only one overcard to your pair, and only two of them left out there? You make a clear mistake by not c-betting there, because that's when the K or A (or even a Jack) falls on the turn and suddenly you've lost the hand. The way you played it, by not getting any information on the turn by failing to c-bet, you probably do need to fold to his shove. But recognize your own fault in it, as this one is not debatable. You made a mistake and it cost you some money.

Your re-raise on the flop with QJ on a J62 flop is back to your usual -- one of the worst plays imaginable. It shows a total lack of thought or basic understanding of poker. Yes, in your mythological story you were of course ahead, but in the real world -- where the rest of us actually play this game called poker for real money -- you are laughably beaten there, at least 99 out of 100 times. It is unthinkable that someone could re-raise with just QJ in that spot -- with no piece of the flush draw no less -- and then evern consider betting the turn, and then after the turn bet gets instacalled for half a buyin, even consider betting again on the river. You show your truly unbelievable poker weakness by your entire analysis and actions on this hand.

Real players fold the QJ there, and do so quickly. When you realize this basic truth, you will know you have progressed to around the level of play of the $.10 / $.20 games online. Until then, you will remain a losing microstakes player forever.

I am a different Anonymous, but I would be interested in a response to Anon's comment. Of course his tone is assholic, but what he says seems to have merit, minus all the dickness. I definitely agree with the first point -- QQ5 is just the type of flop you should definitely be c-betting most of the time with TT on, no? I think the second point is more debatable, but frankly again a lot of what he says has merit. It's a bet then a raise from the guy on the flop, you reraise him and he calls, and then he instacalls a pretty big bet on the turn. How could you justify betting that again on the river like you said you were considering. I think I would be considering what exactly I was about to lose the hand to in that spot. Love to hear your thoughts.

Yeah - I debated cbetting with TT, and I likely should have. I think I cbet a ton with this kind of situation, and I've been trying to back off such a frequent cbet. However, QQ5 is exactly the kind of flop you look for with a mid pair hand. I didn't know anything about my opponent (plus an additional opponent) at this point, and so he doesn't know I pretty freely cbet flops when PFR'd. On the other hand, I thought about what hands could continue if I get called - and what happens on later streets when I cbet. That's why I opted to check through and call the turn bet instead of cbetting the flop.

With the second hand, that's not nearly as debatable as you'd think. As I said in the prior paragraphs to the second hand - the same guy is continuing to raise / bet / be generally aggressive with every pot he enters. Either he's running incredibly hot for 4-5 orbits, or he's way overvaluing his hands and draws. I'm going to err on the overvaluing side of the house. I raise his potential draw on the flop. I bet big on the turn because I know he's snapping any and all draws regardless of price. By the river, I can't really tell where he's at - he's raising AQ, and probably KQ as he's shown to raise a TON of PF hands. Those 2 hands which have me beat are in that wide range. However, there's so many small cards out there that he could show up with a wonky 2 pair Qx that a river bet was ruled out. I still think he's calling a river bet without a 2 pair+ hand that I could get tremendous river value. However, I chickened out because I had a weak-ish 1 pair hand with the standard thought of "what kind of hands call here?" - when I should be thinking what kind of hands does THIS GUY call here with. A standard player is folding draws and showing better hands, but THIS GUY can be showing a wide variety of hands. What the point of the hand retelling was - was to get out of the standard mindset and play the player type, not the standard for the showdown value of the hand.